Former President Joe Biden on May 8 gave his first interview since leaving office, defending his administration and denying reports that he told former Vice President Kamala Harris to mirror his priorities in her 2024 campaign.
Biden and his wife, former first lady Jill Biden, sat down with ABC’s “The View” on the morning of May 8, fielding questions about the 2024 election, Harris’s loss to then-presidential candidate Donald Trump, allegations that he was experiencing mental decline last year, and his reaction to the Republican president’s first 100 days in office.
Biden said he was not surprised that Harris lost to Trump, not because she lacked any qualifications for the presidency, but because he believes that her campaign was hit with claims that a “woman of mixed race” could not lead the country.
“I think we underestimate the phenomenal negative impact that COVID and the pandemic had on people, on attitudes, on optimism, on a whole range of things,” Biden said. “So I was very disappointed, but I wasn’t surprised.”
The former president said he has stayed in touch with Harris and that she recently sought his opinion on an important topic, but he declined to share what it was.
Despite that Trump was the first Republican president to win the popular vote in 20 years, Biden suggested that his former opponent’s victory in 2024 was not a “slam dunk.”
The hosts mentioned how when Harris spoke with them before last year’s election, the former vice president said nothing came “to mind” when asked what she would have done differently from Biden in the previous four years.
Biden said he did not encourage Harris to make that claim, which Trump and the Republican Party used as ammunition against her.
“I did not advise her to say that,” he said. “She was part of every success we had. We'd argue like hell, by the way.”
Biden dropped out of the presidential race in July 2024 and endorsed Harris as his successor after his performance in a debate with Trump the previous month was much criticized.
When asked what he would say to critics who suggest that stepping aside a little more than 100 days before the election hampered the former vice president’s campaign, Biden touted his administration’s accomplishments.
“We got more major legislation passed to fundamentally change the direction of the country than any president has in a long, long time—decades,” Biden said. “My point is that we had a very successful effort to change the direction of the country, and we did, and [Harris] was every single part of that.”
Biden said he waited until this interview to speak about Trump’s first 100 days in office because of a long-standing tradition of allowing one’s successor some time to “get off the ground without going after him.”
“I think he has done, quite frankly, a very poor job in the interest of the United States of America,” Biden said. “I think ... the greatest alliance in the history of the world is NATO, not a joke, and he’s blown it up. I was able to expand it.”
The hosts noted how Trump has mentioned Biden, his family, or his administration hundreds of times since Inauguration Day on Jan. 20, and asked Biden why he believes that the president is fixated on him.
“I beat him,” Biden said with a smile, referring to the 2020 election.
However, the former president said he takes partial responsibility for Trump’s victory in the 2024 election.
“Look, I was in charge, and he won,” he said. “So, you know, I take responsibility.”
When asked about allegations that his cognitive abilities were in “dramatic decline” during the final year of his presidency, Biden said the anonymous sources cited in various media reports were wrong.
“There’s nothing to sustain that,” he said.
Instead, Biden said he dropped out of the race because he did not want to divide the Democratic Party further.
“That’s why I got out of the race,” he said. “And I thought it was better to put the country ahead of my interest, my personal interest. I’m not being facetious. I’m being deadly earnest about that.”
He acknowledged the concerns many had about his age, since he would have been 86 years old by the end of a potential second term.
“I get it,” Biden said. “I understand the concern. I really do. But the point of the matter is that I would offer specific evidence, if we had time, [of] exactly what I got done when I supposedly lost my cognitive capability.”
